Reddit reviews The Little ACT Workbook

I haven’t done CBT myself, I’ve done a bit of something called ACT which is like third wave CBT apparently. I would recommend this book which I’m still reading after getting it post-therapy sessions.

Sorry to hear about your experience with your dad, it’s no wonder you would struggle with associations between relationships and cheating with that intense and emotional history.

What helped me from ACT was the idea that we create ‘stories’ about ourselves that we tend to believe are true about ourselves or life. Such as “I’m always awkward”, or “I’m lazy”, or “relationships always end in infidelity”. It has really helped me to create distance; to remind myself that these are just stories. One exercise my therapist made me do was write a list of these down, in the negative.

For eg I wrote stuff like ‘I never get anything done’, ‘I’m always awkward’, ‘if something good happens, something terrible will happen’. Then on the opposite side of the paper she told me to write the opposite for each statement: ‘I always get everything done’. ‘I’m never awkward’. ‘If something terrible happens, something good will happen’.

See how ridiculous they sound? Neither the positive or the negative statements are true. Nothing is ever always one way. We just grow to believe it is, because our brains out built to figure out patterns. This used to be really useful for us when we needed go spot patterns in our caveman days, but now it’s more of a hinderance, and we will be helped by discovering our stories so that we can see them for what they are.

You mentioned something at the end I’ll have to come back to in an edit..

Back. Divorced a few months ago...caused your feelings to sky rocket, and you don’t know why. Well you do know why, you’ve just said it! Of course this divorce would bring all those feelings to the surface again. We always have a trigger, and if you know what that trigger is then you understand why your anxiety is suddenly amplified. It could be something big and in-your-face like your parents divorce, or it could be a little comment about relationships on reddit that you glanced over. But that’s what made you feel worse. It doesn’t make your fears any more true.

I wish I could give you more specific advice other than recommending this book. But that’s all I can personally say. Your fears are not your fault; anyone would be feeling the same way. But it doesn’t mean they are true. And because those fears are having an impact on your life you are doing the right thing by trying to discover ways to manage them.

I don’t know how much this stuff sounds like what you’ve already gone through with CBT?